Demolitions and Artillery
Introduction This chapter of the Stormwind Army Field Manual will discuss explosives/demolitions and the use of artillery pieces. While the main forces of Stormwind tend to use the bow and sword, there are divisions within the military that utilize cannons, mortars, and explosive devices in an attempt to provide field support, long distance barrages, and targeted structure or emplacement destruction respectively. This chapter is going to discuss ideal targets for demolition, general safety and how to avoid friendly fire when using artillery, range cards and their components, and a breakdown and overview of the artillery pieces fielded by the Kingdom of Stormwind. Prime Targets for Demolition Explosives have a nasty habit of obliterating anything they come in contact with. As such, it's generally a good rule of thumb to identify strategic targets rather than lay waste to everything on the battlefield. Simply put, these targets are anything that either heavily contribute to the enemy’s ability to fight, aid in their logistics, or that prove to be obstructions to our own troop movements. In particular, bridges, supply stockpiles, logistical wagons, troop movement wagons, artillery emplacements, entrenched positions with troop or communications infrastructure, land and air vehicles, and ship hulls to name a few. Equally so, these are the same types of targets that the enemy will seek out so we must defend such targets to the best of our ability. A war cannot be won if our supplies and logistics are hit. · Bridges: By targeting these pieces of infrastructure, we can deny the enemy easy passage into our territory or even back into their own. By strategically targeting bridges, we can also create ambushes, cutting off escape routes in rough terrain. · Supply Stockpiles: A more or less standard target, supply depots can hurt a lot more than regular targets since if the enemy doesn’t have food, water, resources, or weapons, then they will have a very difficult time putting up any kind of defense and quite possibly, an even worse offense. · Logistics Wagons: Similar to supply stockpiles and deports, enemy logistics wagons should very much be targets since these are the vehicles, they use to move the supplies. They can be at the depot, on the road, or even disembarking from ships and would still be considered valuable targets. An enemy’s inability to move supplies around means that strategic positions are more likely to run out of supplies, thus making a siege or assault much easier on our forces. · Troop Wagons: Much like the supply wagons, if we can take out the enemies means of transporting troops across land, then there will be a significant drop in the enemy’s ability to reinforce locations or set up choke points themselves. · Artillery Emplacements: One of the highest value targets, enemy artillery emplacements can wreak havoc on our men and as such, should be considered primary targets for destruction. · Entrenched Positions: While not necessarily trenches in the classic sense, these are any locations that contain some form of infrastructure or weapon emplacements that can be used against us in some way. This could be by way of a communications entrenchment that is used to communicate our forces location to either enemy artillery or sharpshooters, or even entrenched positions that contain further supplies. · Land/Air Vehicles: An obvious pair of targets, if possible, these vehicles should be targeted by our clandestine forces and taken out while they’re still in the depots or on the air fields. As it goes the easiest plane to destroy is one that isn’t in the air. · Ship Hulls: With the contribution of the Zandalari fleet to the Horde, naval ships have become some of the most prime targets for our demolition teams. Considering a fair amount of combat is taking place on both Kul Tiras and Zandalar, it would behoove Alliance forces to target both Horde and Zandalari ships in an attempt to stop further forces and supplies from making it to these combat zones. General Safety and Friendly Fire Friendly fire is the act of accidentally firing on one’s own forces, allied forces, or neutral forces whilst attempting to attack the enemy. This is accomplished by way of misidentifying a target or targets as hostile, cross-fire while engaging the enemy, or just general error and/or inaccuracy. It’s important to note that friendly fire is exceedingly rare in melee combat and that ranged and indirect fire support are the primary ways in which friendly fire will be discussed. Causes The following explanations are a breakdown of the common causes of friendly fire. · Errors of Position: This occurs when targeted fire that is aimed at enemy positions accidentally ends up hitting friendly units. These types of incidents are generally exacerbated by the close proximity of friendly combatants. This error can be reduced with advancements in weapon targeting and overall weapon accuracy but should remain in the minds of every soldier as a possibility. · Errors of Identification: This occurs when friendly troops, neutral forces or civilians are mistakenly identified and attacked in belief they are the enemy. Battles that involve many different forces (such as dwarves, night elves, and other allied forces) can contribute to this error being much more common. · Errors of Response Inhibition: These types of errors, plainly put, occur simply because there was a failure to act to stop or inhibit a shooting response. Safety and Prevention The following are a few ways that both artillery operators and infantrymen can safely operate and operate around artillery pieces. · Training: A simple idea, training is ultimately going to be what a soldier falls back on when they’re unsure of what to do in a given situation. Training exercises that involve trigger discipline are becoming more commonplace in an effort to reduce the casualty count due to friendly fire. Weather is a significant contributor to friendly fire as well, clouding visuals and making it exceedingly difficult to identify enemy targets from friendly targets. Training exercises in bad weather will help Alliance forces become familiar with the silhouettes of our own forces and be able to distinguish them from the enemy. · Technological Advancements: Our Gnomish and Dwarven allies in Ironforge have developed some very important advancements in the realm of weapon targeting systems and friendly unit transponders. While these are the height of the technology, we have to identify our forces, the simple painting of the Stormwind Lion on shields and the classic Stormwindian color scheme of blue trim on our armor also contributes to the efforts to reduce friendly fire by making our forces easy to identify by friendly spotters. Artillery Range Cards Range cards are sketches of the terrain a weapon system has been assigned to cover by fire. It contains information that assists in the planning and controlling of weapon firing, rapid detection and engagement of targets, and the orientation of replacement personnel or units. Range cards can be used quickly by gunners and accurately determine the information they need to engage targets. Sector of Fire A sector of fire is the area of a battlefield that a given emplacement is responsible for engaging targets in. These sectors are assigned to ensure that emplacements will cover target approaches. Sectors should overlap so that not one emplacement is unable to cover a part of their sector. Artillery leaders will give the gunners boundaries that run between prominent terrain features or by general left/right limits as limited by the terrain or azimuths. There is also the distinct possibility that the leader will assign more than one sector to a given gun emplacement, designating them as primary and secondary. Target Reference Points Target reference points are natural or man-made terrain features that can be used as reference points for targeting and the adjustment of indirect fire support. If there are TRP’s in or near the sector of fire, the fire support office will tell the gunners and they will mark them on their range cards. There is usually one TRP but there can be up to three in a given gunners sector. Dead Space Dead space is an area of natural or man-made terrain features that lie within a sector of fire that prevents a gunner from firing in that area. These areas will need to be identified so that alternate forms of fire can cover the dead space, such as man portable mortars or mines. These dead space locations are indicated on the range cards. Sector Length The length of a sector of fire is generally limited by the maximum engagement range of the weapon emplacement. It can also be less than the maximum range of the emplacement if there are terrain features that artificially limit the ability of the emplacement to engage targets at maximum range. Regardless of what affects the maximum range, that number is written down on the range card as the maximum engagement line. Artillery Pieces of Stormwind The following information has been taken from Sir Edrington Wilhelm Grunwald’s work “The Musket Methodology”. Bridgeport 12-pdr Artillery Gun Moving into artillery, the most basic field gun that any soldier will see implemented by the Stormwind Army will be the standard twelve pounder artillery gun, made by the Bridgeport Arms Foundry. Making cannon has, again, been a long-since perfected craft. However, new designs are often taken into consideration. This reliable piece of artillery fires a twelve pound solid shot, and the amounts of powder that are required to fire it vary greatly – more detail on this matter is provided in artillery manuals. The point is that these field guns are used as a versatile piece of equipment: it can fire solid shot at enemy fortifications, explosive shot at enemy infantry, or grapeshot if they get too close. It can be mounted on a wall or wheeled about on a carriage. Ideally, they are transported into battle via horse-drawn limber. Bridgeport 9-pdr Artillery Culverin Meant to be a smaller counterpart to the standard issue cannon, culverins also go by a variety of names depending on their shot weight and caliber: demi-culverins and sakers. For the purpose of this manual, we shall classify culverins as guns primarily intended with not only breaching fortifications, but also dealing heavy amounts of damage towards infantry. Culverins are usually lighter to lug about and move into position, so it makes them perfect for rapid re-positioning and keeping up with enemy infantry movements along the battle line. Bridgeport Infantry Mortar Based off dwarven designs, the Bridgeport infantry mortar is a light but potent alternative to the heavier siege artillery utilized by the battalion and the engineer corps. The infantry mortar is designed to lob specially made shells over a short distance. Its primarily role is not to bombard enemies with earth-shattering firepower, but rather to suppress the enemy and dislodge them from defensive position, thus allowing allied infantry to move in and engage the already shaken and battered foe. The infantry mortar can fire explosive or smoke shells, each with their own benefits. Explosive shells detonate on impact, sending shrapnel in all directions. They can also be particularly effective against lightly armored targets, such as enemy siege engines or fortifications. Smoke shells, when detonated, will unleash a cloud of smoke that will conceal the movement of allied infantry whilst blinding the enemy. Bridgeport 24-pdr Artillery Mortar Cannons shoot straight, mortars lob. This is the primary difference between these two pieces of artillery, and it also offers the savvy artillery commander a wide berth of new choices. The mortar is ideal for bombing enemy positions, especially if the enemy is behind a wall. Furthermore, mortars can deliver heavier payloads, thanks to their incredibly sturdiness. However, it is this resilience that also makes them one of the heaviest pieces of artillery on the field. They require large teams to even move about, and a limber is almost always required even for the shortest of moves. Category:Royal College of Engineers Category:Field Manual